10 Video Game Promotional Tactics That Backfired HORRIBLY
3. God Of War II And The Dead Goat
Upon release, the original God of War was a smash-hit and was just the kind of new lifeblood that the PlayStation 2 needed in its library of exclusives.
So in 2007, in order to build steam at the launch to the game’s sequel, Sony hosted a private party and then subsequently had it reported on in Official PlayStation Magazine.
Now, in defence of Sony, they weren’t anticipating the Daily Mail of all people to pick up on the party and, in the way that only they can, sensationalise it to the nth degree.
They reported that attendees were “invited to reach inside the goat’s still-warm carcass to eat offal from its stomach”, and that they also “threw knives at targets and pulled live snakes from a pit with their bare hands” which... seems unlikely.
Because, not all that shockingly, almost all of this was untrue. Sony pulled 80,000 copies of Official PlayStation Magazine from distribution but the tabloid, rather than attend the party, were basing their facts on a promotional flyer.
However, the presence of a “rented” dead goat from a local butchers was a reality and Sony admitted fault and poor taste. It was this boundary-push that allowed the Daily Mail to absolutely fall over themselves at the opportunity to decry that video games were promoting sacrificial animal slaughter.